Dry ice chassis blasting results...

[Dennis Kalma]

Hi guys, just had the nice people from Icejet come in and dry ice blast my project car. It is a pretty interesting process, basically a sandblaster using dry ice (frozen CO2), bunch of gizmos and a lot of noise. Did the deed in my garage which was a good thing as it is pretty noisy, but most of the noise is from the actual blasting, only noise to disturb the neighbours was the compressor on the driveway.

In any event, it was a bit of an experiment, I would say there are a lot of good things about it but it is definitely less able to remove stuff than sand or bead blasting, but then again, it has the ability to remove paint by the layer...which is sort of cool. It can also completely remove the Porsche undercoat but leave the factory primer intact (see pics below) which is very amazing. It also takes all the road grime, oil, grease, sealant etc off...lot easier than elbow grease, but it is not cheap at about $300 per hour....Canadian of course.

Anyway, here are the pics!





And after bead blasting. Note that I asked them to just experiment, they figured to do the whole car, removing all the paint would be around 4 hours....




Note the primered portion versus the section where the undercoat is still there. Basically it took of quarter sized chunks, it seemed to freeze them first and then blast them off leaving the primer looking brand new. Quite amazing to watch.
I'd have to put the car on a rotisserie if I wanted to strip the whole thing (not sure if I do).

I then asked them to switch to just removing the blue paint and that worked pretty well as well, a bit splotchy but interesting..



Interior is now basically free of any glue or sealants, plus most of the paint is gone.



Here is the guy in mid blast, note the size of the gun, plus it frosts up pretty well....




This is actually the best part, formerly this was full of grease and crap, now it is pretty well clean enough to eat off of. I'll be welding in the plate for the torsion tube change (to fit the six speed as per my other thread.....) and it will be done....

Dennis

[brighton911]

Dennis, thanks for taking the time to post this interesting process. I've seen the baking soda treatment performed but this looks very kind to the panels etc. I'm sure the neighbors appreciate your consideration but I can't imagine how much of a mess you had in garage after doing the whole car.

Dave

[Dennis Kalma]

The mess was not actually that bad, considering that the garage always has some grime in it. Nice thing about dry ice blasting is that the only material left when they leave is what was on the car when they started....no media residue at all since it all just goes to gas. I put up poly around various parts of the garage but if I had to do it again I would not bother. Most the poly got blown around anyway and there really was not much to clean up.

All I did was sweep and vacuum for about an hour and it was back to the way it was before they came...

Dennis

[stealthn]

Very Cool Dennis, so you are not getting the whole car done?

As far as other options, and the lack of cleaning up a ton of sand, how does this price out to other ways of doing it?

[Driver8]

We hired a company to do this same process when we purchased a used printing press that had dried ink all over the sides. When they were finished it look like new. I agree very loud and fairly costly, but it does a fantastic job.

[whiskyb]

A friend of mine just a business doing this exact type of blasting here in town. Offered to do my pine covered house for cost just for the exposure. Has a mobile unit and does everything from graffiti to restoration. Did not realize that it did so well on cars. I am getting ready to do a re-paint on my car and might have to have him to my fenderwells and floors

[Dennis Kalma]

I have not checked recent pricing for bead blasting, but I think this is probably about 50% higher than other methods. There is also a reasonable question about soda blasting to remove paint, but I have not yet checked that out ( I have a new soda blaster set up waiting to be used).

Not sure if you could set up a price by the piece rather than by the hour...I suspect that if you went to them and said $1500 and do the whole car down to primer they'd likely go for it....especially if you were flexible on scheduling.

Dennis

[RWebb]

could it take off paint and leave the wood surface?

a friend has a house with redwood or cedar siding that is painted...

Originally Posted by whiskyb

A friend of mine just a business doing this exact type of blasting here in town. Offered to do my pine covered house for cost just for the exposure. Has a mobile unit and does everything from graffiti to restoration. Did not realize that it did so well on cars. I am getting ready to do a re-paint on my car and might have to have him to my fenderwells and floors

[whiskyb]

Not sure, mine is board and batten pine. He said it would bring it out like new fresh pine. my thinking is that stain would be sunk into the wood deeper them paint so it should work fine. I would want to do some sample pieces first.

[hcoles]

this seems to be catching on.. but only in some areas I guess... I tried to find a service some where here in north California to no avail. If you google it there are, if I remember correctly, a couple companies or more making the equipment. I was thinking it could be good for cleaning up 911 engine blocks/etc.

[Rusty 356]

As a result of this thread I contacted the manufacturer and found that Sun Belt Rentals has one in the tidewater area that I can rent for 500$ per day plus the air compressor and Dry Ice. I'll post some pics during the process and finished goods. should be fun.
Going in with two other guys blasting their P cars.

[RichF]

Rusty let me know how that goes. I'm about to blast mine also.

[Rusty 356]

Rich, I'm in Virginia Beach and Sunbelt has the equipment. Possible to share 4 projects, I want to just do the underside of my 64 SC, one 914-6 and a 73 911 tub.
Have you checked into costs of the co2? local source quoted me 66 to 222 cents per lb depending on quantity. More quantity the less cost so the more the merrier.
PM for contact information

[Porsche_monkey]

Originally Posted by RWebb

could it take off paint and leave the wood surface?

a friend has a house with redwood or cedar siding that is painted...

Yes. They use dry ice to remove severe mould from grow op homes. It blasts the mould off the surface and removes a very very thin layer of wood.